King of the Perverts by Steve Lowe

figure out what’s going on.
    I appear to be in an emergency room. I’m on a movable gurney bed thing in a very tight room with a drape for a door. My head hurts like hell, but it goes beyond the normal hangover headache. I touch the right side and feel a bandage there and massive pain when I poke it. Note to self: don’t poke your head bandage. It’s there for a reason, most likely to cover up a wound of some sort.
    So how the hell did I end up in the hospital with a head wound? And where the fuck is Mongo? And there was someone else from last night, too. What was her name? Mary, I think. Or Sissy? Mimi? Fuck, I don’t know.
    I sit up again, much slower this time to keep down the heave. A faint smell of ass in the air does not help. A nurse-type lady walks in as I’m swinging my legs over the side of the bed.
    “Morning, sunshine!” she says way too fucking loud and cheery. “How’s our favorite drunk ass patient doing?”
    “Ugh.”
    She laughs and flips through a chart. I look at her nametag and then ask Sarah, “How long have I been in here?”
    She flips to the first page of her stack and says, “Let’s see… you were a dump-and-run at four thirty-nine this morning.” She looks at her watch. “Which means you’ve been here for almost four hours.”
    “Dump-and-run?”
    Sarah sets my chart on the small desktop tucked in the corner of the room and looks me over. “Yeah, that’s what we call the drunks who get dropped outside the door by their friends who obviously don’t want to get in trouble, so they just dump ’em and then run off. Front desk security didn’t get a good look at your buddy, but a paramedic said she heard a stream of what sounded like angry Russian, and then there you were with a nasty cut on your head.”
    Shit, what the hell happened? I can’t remember a thing since the bar. I don’t remember leaving anywhere. Was there a bar fight? Did I get hit with a bottle? That doesn’t seem familiar at all.
    I can see stairs.
    Did I fall down stairs?
    And why do I still smell ass? Something in here definitely smells like a butt. I wonder if another patient in the ER has shit themselves, but Sarah sees me sniffing the air like I’m tracking foxes on a morning hunt. She solves the mystery for me by pointing at the tiny sink set in the wall next to the tiny desk.
    “That smell is you,” she says. “Wash your hands and face really well with that antibacterial soap. Wouldn’t want anybody getting E. coli because of you, Senior.”
    •
    About an hour later, a really young doctor named Singh gives me a final check, waving his pen back and forth and up and down and holding it in my peripheral vision. He has me do a few simple balance tests, which I guess I pass because he signs my chart and tells me I don’t appear to have a concussion. He’s got dark circles under his eyes and that malnourished look of a resident nearing the end of a twenty-hour shift, which might explain why I’m being sent out the door so quickly. I don’t think Dr. Singh knows if he’s coming or going.
    So now I’m standing in the lobby of the ER, wondering exactly where I am, where I’m going, where Mongo is, if he’s skipped town after dumping me in front of the hospital, what happened to last night’s challenge. Though by the smell of me, I have a feeling something went down, and that it got a little messy. Fuck, I don’t even want to think about it.
    I’m about to head outside and find a bus stop when I hear, “Dennis?”
    I look around but don’t see her until she’s standing right in front of me. Even then I don’t recognize her at first. The last time I saw her, she was wearing nothing but a thong and her hair was done up different. Right now her hair is pulled back in a ponytail, she’s wearing scrubs, and her face looks to be pretty much clear of any makeup at all. I’m struck by how naturally beautiful she is.
    “Wow, Tricia?”
    “Yeah, hi!” She turns and tells her other scrub-clad